


To Acquire a Heart

by junietuesday25



Series: BMQ Entries [3]
Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, PINS AND PATCHES NEEDS MORE CONTENT SO HERE I AM, Romance, featuring michael and jeremy being bros in the background, in which michael is a cryptid gay who can actually ask out the person he likes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:41:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23390368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/junietuesday25/pseuds/junietuesday25
Summary: jeremytheere:I just saw jakes latest insta post and i want details??Youre like BLUSHING dudemicyclemell:jeremiah pleasei. can’t talk about this over text come overyou’ve had your license for a week now you’ll be fineMichael Mell plans to ask out Jake Dillinger.
Relationships: Jake Dillinger/Michael Mell
Series: BMQ Entries [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1675906
Comments: 10
Kudos: 53





	To Acquire a Heart

Michael Mell knows he’s a loser.

It’s not self-deprecating or anything. Yeah, he knows his best friend is cool now, and his new lunch-mates are literally the most popular kids in school, but being uncool is basically just a part of his _brand_ at this point. His popular sort-of friends are nice, but Michael doesn’t really expect them to bring down their own status to hang with him outside of lunch.

That is, until he gets a surprising text one day.

 **jakeydillpickle:** hey dude u wanna hang out?

Michael stares at his phone, pulling himself up from his chiropractor’s-nightmare slouch to sit up properly against his beanbag.

Jake’s a fine person, truly—if anything, he’s been one of the nicest members of the “squip squad”, if a little overenthusiastic and foot-in-mouth at times. But Michael has no clue what could prompt Jake Dillinger to reach out to, of all people, Michael Mell to hang out.

 **micyclemell:** sure  
what for

Michael’s positive he’s not being subtle about the question marks zooming around his brain, but oh well.

 **jakeydillpickle:** eh no reason  
idk im bored and ur cool so  
mall or smth?  
**micyclemell:** yeah okay  
should i pick you up or  
**jakeydillpickle:** nah text me ur address i can pick u up

Which is how ten minutes later, Michael finds himself in the shotgun seat of none other than the Jake Dillinger’s car—he’d lost his old, obnoxiously flashy sports car in the fire, so now he’s saddled with a plain small gray car. But Jake’s added a lot of personal touches to the inside: sports figurines on the dashboard, beads and trinkets hanging from the rearview mirror, air fresheners on the vents.

That’s a pretty decent metaphor for Jake himself. He’s lost a bit of the popular, perfect sparkle since Michael’s sort of befriended him, but Michael’s also starting to see the authentic personality shine through—Jake’s undeniably dorky about what he loves, and knows a lot more about sports than just how to play them. He’s also more intelligent than most people seem to grasp; everyone knows he does just about every club the school offers, but few realize that it means he’s part of Model UN and debate club and creative writing and advanced math. 

Also, maybe getting to know the real Jake through his popular mask has allowed Michael to look directly at him and see how cute he is. It’s kind of really embarrassing, but over the past few weeks, suddenly Michael’s gone from acknowledging that most of the student body finds Jake attractive to actually being _part_ of that percentage that’s into Jake.

“So what were you doing before I texted?” says Jake out of nowhere, cutting through Michael’s thoughts as he stares out Jake’s car’s window.

“Nothing much?” Michael says, weirdly nervous about making a good impression, and it isn’t just because of his crush. He, well, hasn’t really made any friends other than Jeremy, and they simply clicked together the way kindergartners did and never left each other’s side after that. Michael doesn’t exactly know how to make friends with people from scratch now that they’re older. “Just watching documentaries in my basement. I was halfway through this one about the evolution of whales, they used to be these, like, dog-sized land mammals until they eventually started drifting closer and closer into water and then became like, walking whales with blowholes halfway up their skulls until they became fully aquatic—”

Suddenly Michael realizes he’s been rambling at Jake, so he stops, but for his part, Jake seems to have been listening.

“That’s kinda badass,” he says. “It’s weird to think there were like, whales with noses halfway up their faces just walking around, though.”

“It is!” Michael grins. “Wait ‘til you hear about these sharks with _buzzsaws_ as their lower jaws—”

* * *

**jeremytheere:** I just saw jakes latest insta post and i want details??  
Youre like BLUSHING dude

Michael rolls onto his side, making a face at his phone.

The trip to the mall basically just consisted of Michael and Jake infodumping to each other about various topics over Sbarros pizza, which was more fun than it might sound and also Michael’s, like, dream date. Except it wasn’t a date, but it was still great! At the end, Jake took a quick selfie of the two, and apparently he’d posted it on Instagram.

 **micyclemell:** jeremiah please  
i. can’t talk about this over text come over  
you’ve had your license for a week now you’ll be fine

Ten minutes later, Jeremy’s sitting on the edge of Michael’s bed, where Michael is now faceplanted. Jeremy pokes him in the back.

“I didn’t come over here for nothing,” he says, voice full of laughter, because Jeremy is a terrible awful person who Michael hates with his whole soul. “Spill.”

Michael grumbles into his pillow. “It’s _embarrassing,_ ” he whines. “The whole point of me is that I don’t like what everyone else likes and now I’m—”

Michael cuts himself off, but it’s too late. He feels Jeremy shifting to lean against the wall as he full-on _cackles_ , hearing a slight clatter when Jeremy seemingly bumps into the LED angel wings Michael has hung up. 

“So—so you’re mad because you’re so hipster you can’t have a crush on Jake?” When Michael sits up, Jeremy’s trying to straighten the wings he’d knocked askew, still giggling. “I love you so much, oh my God.”

“One, get your grubby hands off my lights—“ Michael reaches over and fixes them “—and two, stop laughing! It’s not funny!”

“Okay, I’m sorry,” Jeremy says, twisting to lean against the bare wall. “Are you gonna do anything about Jake?”

Michael slumps back down into his comfy blanket nest, pulling his hood around to cover his face. “Like what?” he says into the fabric. “Ask him out? There’s no way he likes me, I’d be setting myself up for failure.”

“No way,” Jeremy says. “Jake is crushing so hard on you, he stares at you _all the time_ and laughs at all your jokes and blushes around you so much, I’ll eat my—my phone if he doesn’t say yes.”

“Wouldn’t be the weirdest piece of technology you’ve vored,” Michael mumbles, but he’s replaying memories of his interactions with Jake, trying to remember if Jeremy’s right. 

“Michael, you asshole,” Jeremy says, but there’s no real venom. A few months ago, squip jokes would’ve been a million miles too far, but now they can usually bring it up casually without adverse reaction. “I’m telling you, you should go for it! The worst thing he can do is turn you down.”

“Okay, Mr. ‘I wrote Christine a letter telling her how I feel, but then I tore it up and flushed it,’” says Michael. “I had to hype you up to even just talk to her for literal _years._ ”

“Yeah, and we’re dating now,” says Jeremy, and gives a small, giddy grin at the words. “So you’re gonna sit up next to me, and I’m gonna open my notes app, and we’re gonna plan for you to ask him out. Okay?”

“Not okay,” Michael groans, but scoots up beside Jeremy anyway. “You’re mean and I hate you and you have to be there to Netflix binge and ice cream with me when this all goes to shit.”

“Done,” says Jeremy, beaming at the victory.

* * *

“Hey, Jake,” Michael says at the end of the next Friday, catching Jake by his locker. “Do you, um, wanna go do something after school?”

“Yeah, sure, I’m free,” says Jake, standing up and shrugging on his backpack, because Jake’s the star of a teen rom-com like that. “Like what?”

“Uh.” Michael resists the urge to pull the string of his hoodie up to his mouth and bite it. “The planetarium has a show in an hour? We could go to that. I have an extra ticket.”

“Rad,” says Jake, smiling, and Michael’s heart thumps. Not now, gayness! “I’ll text you then?”

“I can drive us,” Michael says, but Jake shakes his head.

“You got us the tickets, I can drive,” says Jake. “I wanna.”

Jake leaves. As soon as he’s gone, Michael presses his hands to his mouth and does a little spin, grinning hard against his palms. He pulls out his phone and texts Jeremy.

 **micyclemell:** DUDE ok he said yes im????  
AAAAAAAA  
ILYSM OH MYG OD THANK YOU FOR CNOVINCING ME TO DO THIS  
**jeremytheere:** Lmao youre welcome  
Have fun be safe dont explode from crush feelings  
**micylemell:** I’LL TRY

* * *

An hour later, Michael is sliding into Jake’s shotgun seat for the second time that week, armed with a Tangle Jr. hidden in his hoodie pocket so he doesn’t need to go spin around whenever Jake does something cute, which is like, every few seconds.

“Do y’know what the show’s about?” asks Jake, as Michael puts the directions to the planetarium into Jake’s GPS.

“I think the moon?” says Michael, sitting back as Jake starts driving. “And the geography of it and stuff.”

“Cool,” says Jake. They’re quiet after that, but it’s a comfortable silence; Michael bops his head along to whatever music Jake has on, and Jake smiles whenever he looks over, and that’s about it, but it’s really…nice? Michael tends to talk a lot, but this is also relaxing, and this way, Michael gets to steal glances at Jake every so often without slowing down and stumbling over his words and being uber-obvious about his crush.

Although, if the day ends as hoped, Michael won’t have to hide his crush anymore.

* * *

Michael is squishing his Tangle over and over as he hands his and Jake’s tickets over to the person at the entrance to the planetarium.

“We can just grab any seat,” Michael tells Jake, as they enter the planetarium and scan the rows of seats. “Where d’you wanna sit?”

“Closer to one side’s probably the best,” says Jake, leading Michael over to a pair of seats by the right of the room. “So we don’t have to crane our necks super high but we can still see everything.”

They get settled in their seats, Michael staring up at the ceiling to avoid glancing sideways at Jake too much. Right now, the ceiling is slowly fading between colors of the rainbow, the projection lights flashing at the center of the room. Around them, families and friends and couples are getting themselves comfortable, or reading through packets about constellations. Michael would’ve taken some, but he already read these ones when they first came out two weeks ago—the planetarium makes new booklets every month.

Suddenly the lights dim, and the scene above changes from solid color to a full sky of stars, sparkling across the vivid shades of the Milky Way. Every time, Michael’s still in awe of how lifelike it is.

“Welcome to Middleborough Planetarium,” a smooth voice rings out, “and let us now present: The Nearest World…”

The narrator talks about ancient civilizations’ myths about the moon, and the moon race back in the sixties, current projects to study and map the moon, and the science of the moon’s formation, showing close-up photos of the moon’s surface up on the ceiling. Michael loves it, of course, but every so often, he looks over at Jake; the stars on the projection are reflecting off his face, and he’s looking so enraptured by the story the narrator is telling. 

Michael smiles softly, and turns his attention back to the presentation, which is now demonstrating how the moon’s different phases work.

It seems like only minutes later when the lights brighten once again, the ceiling going a blank white as the people around them stretch and talk, streaming out the door.

“That was really cool!” Jake says, grinning at Michael, and he feels his heart melting. “I’ve gotta come here more often.”

“Yeah,” Michael says, smiling. “This place is great, they have new presentations pretty often. Actually,” he continues, “do you wanna, uh, get lunch after?”

“Sure!” says Jake, standing up. “Just tell me where.”

* * *

“And then I’m kinda panicking because like, I was literally five and I was so scared the police were gonna bust my door down, so I don’t say anything until I get home, and I go ‘oh my god Mom I accidentally stole these baseball cards it was an accident I promise!’, and then all she says is ‘it’s okay’, which, looking back, I should’ve predicted the whole money laundering thing, but—”

“Baby Jake crying over stealing is the funniest image I’ll ever see,” says Michael, laughing over his plate of waffles. They’re at a 24-hour breakfast diner, and the conversation topics have ranged from the Chuck E. Cheese pizza conspiracy (“It literally has to be true, there’s no fucking way it’s not”) to Mr. Reyes’s new musical, _Ham-Let Me Free from This Juvie Hall_ (“So like _Love in Hate Nation_ but Shakespeare?”) to imagining the hell they could raise with a Time-Turner from Harry Potter (“I could—I could have five different versions of myself going to five different parties, I’d be unstoppable”). “I can’t believe you’re a thief.”

“I’m not a _thief,_ ” Jake protests, and Michael raises an eyebrow, because that was a story about the _first_ time Jake had ever stolen something—then again, what had prompted the story was how Jake was terrified of doing anything illegal, but he’s so forgetful that sometimes he’d stick things in his pockets, too lazy to get a basket, then forget that they were there and walk out without paying for them. “I’m just…really good at acquiring things that aren’t mine.”

 _Yeah,_ Michael’s brain immediately says, _like my heart._

Michael cringes as soon as it registers, because _Jesus Christ,_ he’s not that cheesy, is he? But if he can fall in love with Jake Dillinger, maybe he can be that kind of hopeless romantic too. Or, at least for this moment, anyway.

Well, the whole point of this day out was to confess to Jake. So—

“Yeah,” Michael says, trying to keep his tone light and _not_ like he’s internally freaking out. “Like my heart.”

Michael practically sees the record scratch happen in Jake’s brain. Jake blinks.

“Oh,” Jake says, and slowly breaks into a grin. “Really?”

“Really,” Michael says, giddy at the reaction. “I like you.”

“Awesome, ‘cause I like you,” Jake says. “Was this whole thing a date?”

“Well, it can be, if you want,” says Michael, grinning. “ _Our_ whole thing can be dating, too?”

“That’d be bangin’,” says Jake. “Can we kiss?”

So they do.

**Author's Note:**

> im SORRY this feels so rushed, especially the end i have a meeting with my class in like 8 hours and i need a ridiculous amount of sleep to function according to my adhd and this fic was due in a few hours so!! not my best ending. BUT i have a whole au coming for pins n patches so stay tuned for that
> 
> also michael's ramble about the evolutionary history of whales was pulled straight from my memory, bc i'm a fucking nerd like that. i fell down a prehistoric rabbit hole and that's also how i discovered the buzzsaw shark that i'm pretty sure used to live in what's now idaho


End file.
